Gilded Cage
by Sparks
Summary: Someone has been living in a gilded cage. He is about to break loose.


"Someone once told me that to write well, you have to write what you know. This is what I know:  
  
I am a seventeen year old guy. I have three weeks to go until I graduate from my school, Hogwarts. After that I have just under a month until my eighteenth birthday, and freedom. I suppose that sounds a bit weird…I mean, most teenagers don't think of their eighteenth birthday as freedom –they think of it as a milestone, a removal of rules. Anything but a doorway to freedom.  
  
Perhaps that's a little unfair. Some people do think of it as freedom, but I'm fairly certain that none have as much reason to believe in it as I do. Because I have always lived within a gilded cage. An invisible cage, one that doesn't have tangible bars, but a cage nonetheless. It was carefully constructed, when I was only a child, of half-truths and outright lies, irresistible temptations and undeserved punishments. What hurts most of all that those people who I have grown to trust, to live, have helped to keep me a captive of a destiny they willing forced onto my shoulders.  
  
I wonder if there is such a thing as destiny anyway. I mean, they all go on about how it was my destiny to say those two, short, damning words and 'save the wizarding world', but I wonder how many of them believe in destiny. Most don't, I know that. I wonder if Dumbledore does, or if he was just trying to justify my loss of innocence to himself.  
  
I'm getting a little off-track. This is confusing, you know. I can't just spout out what happened, just the facts, like some good little Gryffindor. I don't feel like a Gryffindor anymore, you see. There's darkness inside me. It started growing years ago, but I started feeling it when I said those words. I am no longer the innocent Gryffindor they all know and love to put in danger's way. So forgive me if at times I become a little incoherent. I feel too deeply about the events in my life over the past seven years to say this without getting off-track and emotional.  
  
My first year at Hogwarts…that's where it began, of course. Before that – for the first eleven years of my life – I had been kept in complete ignorance of who I am. I had been kept in my gilded cage, covered in blankets. On my eleventh birthday, the blankets were pulled from my face. I was told that I was a wizard, and that I had defeated the most powerful Dark Lord in a century. I suppose I should have guessed then…but of course, I didn't. I was thrilled – who wouldn't have been? I was leaving the place I had been living in, and I would only have to return there for two months of the year. It was heaven to me.  
  
I made friends, of course. Only two good friends, but almost everyone was friendly to me. I was their Golden Boy, you see. I was famous. Everyone wanted to be able to boast that they knew the Boy Who Lived. The Slytherins didn't, but then again, I could hardly blame them for their resentment.  
  
The first year passed swiftly, but with it came the first hint of something wrong in my life. One of my teachers turned out to be sharing his body with the selfsame Dark Lord I had defeated when I was only a baby. I was indirectly given the tools to defeat him; my father's invisibility cloak, sent to me by Dumbledore as an anonymous Christmas present; the knowledge of how the Mirror of Erised worked; opportunities, taken or not, to solve the irresistible puzzle of who wanted that damned Philosopher's Stone.  
  
But I faced the Dark Lord again, and again I defeated him. I came away from the experience with barely a scar, either mental or physical. I had learnt from the experience, and grown, but I still did not see my gilded cage.  
  
I had to return to my muggle prison that summer. That cage, at least, I could see. I could not fight against it, and sometimes I barely managed to live with it, but I always had to hope of returning home to comfort me. By home I meant, of course, Hogwarts.  
  
My second year started badly, and continued even worse. The Heir of Slytherin, and his beast, haunted the school, petrifying Muggle-borns wherever they went. People suspected me, because of my singular ability to converse with snakes. A trait of the darkness within me. In fact, it was my best friend's little sister that was unwittingly letting out the beast, a basilisk, but again it was the Dark Lord, this time working through his diary from his own time at Hogwarts. Again, I had been given just enough information to ensure that I would solve this puzzle – but this time it was, I think, a little more unknowingly that they gave me the information. I discovered about the Chamber of Secrets, about the basilisk…and about a curious quirk of fate – another reason for my 'destiny'. Of course, at the time I had no idea – and was not told – that the reason I could use Godric Gryffindor's sword was because I was one of his descendants. They didn't want me to know that little fact yet, so I was kept ignorant in my gilded cage.  
  
My third year wasn't the worst year I had, but it was an eventful one, and an informative one. Sirius Black – the godfather I was ignorant of – escaped from wizard prison, and was supposedly after me. Of course, people fretted about my safety, disguising their security measures as meant for the entire school. I'm sure that was an added bonus for them, but looking back, I can see why they felt the need to post Dementors around the school. Sirius Black, after all, was a mass murderer, who was after their Golden Boy, their saviour. But I still had relative freedom in the school. My Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher turned out to have been one of my father's friends. He taught me how to protect myself against the Dementors, and I gave him a few hours in the company of his best friends' son. It was good, spending time with someone who didn't expect me to be a saviour all the time. Still, sometimes in his eyes, I could see that expectancy, that disappointment when I didn't live up to his ideals.  
  
Sirius Black wasn't a murderer, as it turns out. I barely remember what happened that night, when I first met him, but I remember that for a few short hours I thought I would be leaving my muggle prison to live with him…of course, that hope was snatched away from me when our proof of his innocence escaped. It was…one of the most disappointing moments of my life. But at least I knew there was someone who cared for me, even if he couldn't be with me. There was someone who wouldn't expect me to be the Boy Who Lived, but just wanted me. Just me.  
  
I should have known better.  
  
My fourth year…what a disaster that turned out to be. I remember nothing from my lessons that year. The only thing I came away with is…never let your guard down. Never allow yourself, even for a moment, to think that you're safe. Because you never are. It was the first blow to my innocence, and the first glimpse I got of my gilded cage. I couldn't see it at the time, but that year, Dumbledore was at his most unprotecting of his little saviour. He had always taken care, before that, that I was never in any real danger. I was that year.  
  
The Dark Lord. It all comes back to him, doesn't it? He fixed it so that In was in the Tri-Wizard Tournament. He turned the Cup into a Portkey. Not him personally, of course, it was one of his servants, but it was on his orders. I hate Portkeys now. I never travel by them anymore, unless it's absolutely necessary and I've created the Portkey myself. People put it down to a character quirk…but it's not. It's because of what happened when I and another Champion, Cedric, were pulled by the Portkey to a graveyard and the Dark Lord.  
  
Cedric was killed. My blood was used in a Dark ritual that restored him to his full power. I was forced to go through a mockery of a duel…then I made it back. I was forced to relive the experience for Dumbledore, who cared enough to show the smallest signs of triumph when I told him that the Dark Lord could touch me now. For you see, if the Dark Lord could touch me, then I could also touch him…and killing him would be that much easier. For that, of course, was the reason why I was kept in a gilded cage.  
  
My fifth year was a mass of lessons. Almost daily owls arrived for students, tied with a black ribbon to indicate that it was what we nicknamed 'doom letters'. Letters that told of a relative's death. Apart from my normal lessons, I was also given extra Potions, Defence Against the Dark Arts, and Duelling lessons. I did not care to ask why – it was obvious, or so I thought. The Dark Lord would be coming after me, so I had to be able to defend myself. Even then, I only had a barest glimpse of my gilded cage, and no idea of what it meant. I was being taught to kill. To protect myself whilst battling, whilst killing. I learnt my lessons well, and to my surprise I did not face the Dark Lord that year. Instead I duelled with his servants in the school grounds, trying desperately to keep my friends safe. The teachers were there. It was then that I began to realise that it was I, and not the adults, that was expected to save the world. I began to see my gilded cage clearly, and I didn't like what I saw.  
  
But I kept quiet, like a good little Gryffindor, and spent the entirety of my sixth year learning curses, jinxes, hexes…anything that I could use in my own defence. My friends were there helping me, of course, but they could not see the urgency for it that I could. Because I knew now why I was called the Boy Who Lived. Why I was their Golden Boy, their saviour. Because they expected me to save them, however unjust and unwise it might be to send a sixteen year old boy against a Dark Lord.  
  
And send me against him they did. When my sixth year was almost over, I was kidnapped again, from right under Dumbledore's eyes…and I am sure that, if he had known of the danger, he would have stopped it. In an alternate reality, that is. A perfect opportunity, I heard him say afterwards. A perfect opportunity for the Boy Who Lived to show his skills and to defeat the Dark Lord. And of course, I failed the test. I could not say the words. I faced the Dark Lord…and I was rescued by the spy, my Potions Professor, who blew his cover to do it. To save the saviour. He could see in my eyes that I had seen my gilded cage, the one he had apparently protested against, and he saved me from death so that I could fight against the cage.  
  
And fight I did. I refused to attend any more 'special lessons', except in Potions, which I admitted to myself that I still needed. I was head boy in my seventh year – I had been a prefect in my sixth – and I claimed that they could hardly expect me to take a dozen extra lessons a week and take on the responsibilities and duties of a head boy. Dumbledore gave me the choice of lessons or being the head boy, obviously expecting me to choose the lessons. I surprised him, and disappointed him, but I could see a glint of approval in Snape's eyes whenever I met them that made it worth it.  
  
Of course, for all my denials, I had to accept the fact that the Dark Lord was after me. Snape assured me that I knew enough, should it come down to it, to destroy the Dark Lord. I hoped it wouldn't come down to it. I did not want to kill. I did not want to give in to the growing darkness within in me. I knew it was there, you see, but it was another of those things I emphatically refused to accept.  
  
He came. He actually attacked the school! No-one could believe it…the students were all gathered into the Great Hall, where a multitude of wards, both physical and magical, were set up. I remained outside them. No-one questioned that I should stay outside. Snape hovered at my shoulder, ready to defend me should anyone be too obvious about their expectancy of the moment when I would leave the castle and face the Dark Lord. I did nothing to alleviate them of their beliefs. There was no point. Of course I would face him. I knew now, after hours of careful research, that I was Gryffindor's Heir. The knowledge felt like a metaphorical albatross hung from my neck. It was a part of my destiny, you see. Gryffindor fought Slytherin, thus Gryffindor's Heir must fight Slytherin's Heir. I hated it, but I finally accepted that there was nothing I could do about it. The gilded cage that surrounded me still confined me, and I knew it.  
  
So I faced the Dark Lord for one final time. I duelled with him, and then, for the first and only time, I said two small words. I killed him. There was very little left…a rotting carcass, covered by a robe. His wand, which I snapped swiftly, despite the outcry from my teachers. His servants were taken care of by the teachers. I was obviously only expected to be capable of defeating the leader, not the mindless minions. To be fair, saying those two words had taken a lot out of me – it was all I could do to stumble into the school…but it was insulting, that they expected me to kill the Dark Lord and then rushed to my rescue when I had done what they were too cowardly to do.  
  
That was three weeks ago. It was only afterwards that I realised that the gilded cage was still there. They still expected me to be the Boy Who Lived, their Golden Boy, the saviour, their sweet and innocent Gryffindor. If they looked into my eyes, they knew that the innocent Gryffindor was no more. Not many dared. But Dumbledore did, and the defeat, the disappointment in his eyes made me want to vomit. That he dared be disappointed in me after what I'd done for him. Dumbledore used his tools well, but I was sick and tired of it, and told him so bluntly.  
  
I have three weeks until my graduation. Seven weeks until I can leave this place forever. I will not stay in the wizarding world. Of course I won't. It is my cage, carefully gilded to appear pleasant, but still made from the same cold iron that keeps in all prisoners. And I refuse to be a prisoner of my destiny any longer.  
  
I am seventeen years old, and I have seen more death in the past seven years than anyone deserves to see in a lifetime.  
  
I am seventeen, and I am famous the world over for something I loathe thinking about.  
  
I am nearly eighteen, and I am nearly free. 


End file.
